Web property generator

ABSTRACT

Pursuant to some embodiments, systems, methods, apparatus and computer program code for creating and administering virtual affinity groups are provided. Pursuant to some embodiments, a computer implemented processing method is provided which includes receiving, at an insurance processing platform, information identifying at least a first characteristic of a virtual affinity group, receiving, at the insurance processing platform, information identifying at least a first feature of the virtual affinity group and at least a first insurance related benefit to be offered to the virtual affinity group, automatically identifying at least a first individual matching the at least first characteristic, and communicating to the at least first individual information allowing the at least first individual to participate in the virtual affinity group.

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a continuation application of co-pending U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. 14/143,512 entitled System And Method For CreatingInsurance Virtual Affinity Groups, filed Dec. 30, 2013, which in turn isa continuation application of U.S. patent application Ser. No.13/712,435 entitled System And Method For Creating And AdministeringInsurance Virtual Affinity Groups, filed Dec. 12, 2012, now U.S. Pat.No. 8,639,603, which in turn claims the benefit of and priority to,under 35 U.S.C. 119(e), U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No.61/659,749, filed on Jun. 14, 2012, the contents of all of which arehereby incorporated herein by reference in their entireties for allpurposes.

BACKGROUND

Advances in computing and data processing have led to the creation oflarge sets of data about consumers and their interests. The dataincludes information from a wide variety of sources, including postaldata, census and demographic data, and increasingly, data accumulatedvia user interaction with social media and other Websites such asFACEBOOK®, TWITTER®, Internet forums, question and answer sites (such asSTACKEXCHANGE®), and the like.

Frequently, this interaction data can be matched to a specificindividual or business. Advertisers currently use some data to targetadvertising to individuals based on their interests. For example,GOOGLE® provides tools for advertisers to place keyword anddemographically-targeted ads on Web pages which are considered to berelevant to consumers based on their search terms and based on theirlocation and other demographic information.

Many consumers affirmatively take steps to join and participate ingroups that provide information or benefits based on sharedcharacteristics of a group. For example, many consumers who are retiredor near retirement age join (and pay a monthly or annual fee to) theAARP. Membership in such a traditional group provides a number ofbenefits to consumers who join, including discounts on certain productsas well as information of interest to consumers who share thecharacteristic of being at or near retirement age. Unfortunately,however, participation requires that a consumer proactively seek out andobtain a membership in the group.

Individuals and businesses often search for, comment on, and interactwith topics of interest that either involves insurable assets (such asautomobiles, motorcycles, homes, electronics, or the like) or that couldprovide information to insurance underwriters regarding the insurabilityof the individual or business. It would be desirable to use informationfrom such searches, comments and interactions to provide insurancerelated offers and information to such individuals or businesses.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is block diagram of a system according to some embodiments of thepresent invention.

FIG. 2 is block diagram of a system according to some embodiments of thepresent invention.

FIG. 3 is block diagram of a system according to some embodiments of thepresent invention.

FIG. 4 is a flow diagram of a process according to some embodiments ofthe present invention.

FIG. 5 is a user interface diagram depicting a virtual affinity groupuser interface according to some embodiments of the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Pursuant to some embodiments, systems, methods, apparatus and computerprogram code for creating and administering virtual affinity groups areprovided. Pursuant to some embodiments, a computer implementedprocessing method is provided which includes receiving, at an insuranceprocessing platform, information identifying at least a firstcharacteristic of a virtual affinity group, receiving, at the insuranceprocessing platform, information identifying at least a first feature ofthe virtual affinity group and at least a first insurance relatedbenefit to be offered to the virtual affinity group, automaticallyidentifying at least a first individual matching the at least firstcharacteristic, and communicating to the at least first individualinformation allowing the at least first individual to participate in thevirtual affinity group. In some embodiments, the at least firstcharacteristic of the virtual affinity group is selected from a knownaggregated group of insurance characteristics. For example, the at leastfirst characteristic may be a demographic or psychographic attribute ofconsumers or businesses that are known or predicted to possess a desiredinsurance risk profile. The aggregated group of insurancecharacteristics may be obtained from insurance underwriting data,existing or predicted loss and claim data, or the like. In someembodiments, the at least first characteristic is selected as a seed orstarting point for the creation of a virtual affinity group andadditional characteristics may be identified to further refine theparticipants in the virtual affinity group.

As used herein, the term “virtual affinity group” refers to a group ofone or more individuals or entities that have been identified asmatching one or more eligibility criteria or characteristics (e.g., suchthat the individuals or entities possess a common “affinity” orinterest). The group is referred to as being “virtual” in that therelationship between the individuals or entities need not be physical ordefined other than based on their common affinity or interest.

Prior to discussing features of some embodiments, an illustrative (butnot limiting) example will be provided. This example will be referencedthroughout the remainder of this specification to assist in describingfeatures of some embodiments. In the illustrative example, an operatoror administrator of a system pursuant to the present invention hasidentified (either automatically by operation of the system orotherwise) that car enthusiasts with certain criteria are desirableinsurance prospects. More particularly, for the purposes of theillustrative example, it has been determined that there are a number ofenthusiasts who are interested in (or have) AUDI A4 automobiles. Theseenthusiasts express their interest by searching the Internet usingkeywords such as “AUDI A4”, “AUDI A4 forum”, “AUDI A4 mods”, etc.Further, these enthusiasts visit Internet sites such as AUDIworld.com,AUDIforums.com and the like, and many of the enthusiasts post commentson those sites. Further, many of the enthusiasts express their interestin AUDI A4 automobiles by “liking” AUDI A4 on FACEBOOK® or other socialnetworking sites or by including “AUDI A4” (or variants thereof) intheir profile on various sites.

In the illustrative example, an operator or administrator of a system ofthe present invention establishes characteristics for an AUDI A4 virtualaffinity group. The characteristics may include criteria for inclusionin the affinity group. The criteria may include demographic criteria(for example, the individual must be located in the United States, oreven a region within the United States), socio-economic criteria (e.g.,the individual must be located in an area that has, or otherwise beknown to have, an annual household income greater than $100,000), and aninterest level (e.g., as measured by the quantity, quality and/or natureof their comments, posts, and searches for topics relating to AUDI A4automobiles). In the illustrative example, at least a first of thecharacteristics is identified based on existing insurance data that isknown or predicted to provide a desired insurance risk profile (e.g., itmay be known that the aggregated group that consists of individualsresiding in certain geographical areas and who have an annual householdincome greater than $100,000 present a desired insurance risk profilefor certain types of personal lines insurance policies).

Once one or more characteristics have been established, the operator oradministrator may establish content and features of the virtual affinitygroup. In some embodiments, this may include establishing a separate webproperty associated with the group (which may be an automaticallygenerated subdomain or top level domain) as well as establishing contentand content sources for the virtual affinity group. The content andcontent sources may include informative articles or other items ofcontent of specific interest to a group of AUDI A4 aficionados. Further,the web property may include interactive features (such as a forum, theability to ask questions, provide answers, upload pictures, or thelike). The web property may also include an aggregation of content andother information from other sources (e.g., via RSS or other feeds ofdata). The operator or administrator may also define one or moreinsurance-related offers or benefits to provide to members of thevirtual affinity group. For example, an automobile policy (or set ofpolicies) may be created or tailored to AUDI A4 owners (or prospectiveowners).

Once the web property and insurance-related offers or benefits have beendefined, the operator or administrator may trigger or launch a processwhich identifies eligible individuals. This process may run continuouslyor periodically to identify new individuals. Eligible individuals may bethose individuals who meet the criteria established by the operator oradministrator (e.g., pursuant to the example, anyone living in the U.S.who has an annual household income greater than $100,000 and whoexpresses a high level of interest in AUDI A4 automobiles may be aneligible individual). Once identified, those individuals may be invitedor encouraged to join the AUDI A4 virtual affinity group throughadvertisements for the virtual affinity group, targeted emails, postalmail, or the like. An individual who wishes to participate may thenvisit the web property associated with the virtual affinity group andenjoy the content and features of the web property, as well as theinsurance-related benefits created for the group. In some embodiments,no web property need be created—instead, the group may simply consist ofqualified members who are eligible to receive insurance related benefitsand offers. As will be described further below, such virtual affinitygroups may also be private or anonymous such that an eligible individualneed not take any action to enjoy the insurance-related benefits.

As another illustrative, but not limiting, example, an insurance companymay identify that physically active males between the age of 35 and 45present a desirable insurance profile (based on an analysis of existingclaim and loss data). A virtual affinity group may be established basedon that information and physically active males in that age range may beidentified by analyzing data from a wide variety of sources, includingdata from users of exercise sensors (such a that provided by FITBIT® orthe like), data from social networks and the like. Such further analysismay result in the addition of further data sources to identifyindividuals for participation in the virtual affinity group and/or theaddition of further characteristics to further refine the definition ofthe group.

For example, it may be determined that participants of a virtualaffinity group consisting of active males between the age of 35 and 45may be identified by analyzing specific additional types of social data.For example, it may be determined that many of these physically activemales frequently post information about their workouts or activities onsites such as Crossfit.com, RunKeeper.com or the like or share exerciseand fitness data using a fitness API such as that provided by FITBIT®.As a result, the data collection systems for this virtual affinity groupmay be expanded to include monitoring and analysis of these sites anddata sources. Further analysis of the virtual affinity group may alsoresult in the identification of additional desired characteristics ofthe group. For example, it may be determined that physically activemales between the age of 35 and 45 who walk at least 10,000 steps eachday or who take part in CROSSFIT workouts an average of 3 times a weekare highly desirable insurance prospects. The characteristics of thevirtual affinity group may be modified to include these additionalcharacteristics (or new virtual affinity groups may be created whichinclude these additional characteristics) and data collection andidentification tools may be modified to identify individuals possessingthese characteristics.

Further details, and features and advantages of virtual affinity groupswill become apparent upon reading the following detailed description.Features of some embodiments will now be described by first referring toFIG. 1 which is a block diagram of a processing platform 100 accordingto some embodiments of the present invention. The platform 100 may, forexample, facilitate the creation and administration of virtual affinitygroups using demographic, search, community, social and business networkbased data such as information published by individuals or businesses(e.g., via TWITTER, FACEBOOK, GOOGLE+, or the like), as well asinformation shared by individuals or businesses via searches, comments,postings, or the like. For illustrative, but not limiting, purposes suchinformation may be published by sites or networks including EBAY.COM,FACEBOOK.COM, LINKEDIN.COM, TWITTER.COM, BLOGGER.COM, MYSPACE.COM,FRIENDSTER.COM, GOOGLE+, YOUTUBE, PINTEREST and other similar sites.Information may also be obtained from applications (such as thoseprovided through the Apple® store, the Android® marketplace or the like)and devices (such as mobile phones, navigation systems, desktopcomputers or the like). Information may also be obtained from monitoringor telematics devices. For example, fitness and health data may beobtained from wireless-enabled scales (which measure and provide dataregarding weight and body mass), wearable devices that measure data suchas the number of calories expended, the number of steps walked, thequality of sleep, or the like. Such data may be obtained from one ormore data repositories such as those provided by FITBIT® or the like.For clarity and ease of exposition, individuals and businesses usingfeatures of the present invention to receive insurance services andinformation may generally be referred to herein as “consumers” or“individuals”.

According to some embodiments, a virtual affinity group processingplatform 110 may be provided for establishing, identifying, notifying,and otherwise administering virtual affinity groups based on data from avariety of sources, including social network sites, operator entry,Websites, or the like. By way of example only, the virtual affinitygroup processing platform 110 may be associated with and/or communicatewith (or receive information about) customers, prospects, or otherindividuals and entities operating a variety of devices, including, forexample, personal computers 102 (including desktop, laptop, tablet, orother types of computers), mobile devices 104 (such as mobiletelephones), and other data devices 106 (such as sensors, networkeddevices, or the like).

In embodiments described herein, the virtual affinity group processingplatform 110 may be operated to both establish and maintain virtualaffinity groups, but also to perform a number of insurance-relatedactivities, including the pricing, underwriting, issuance,administration and support of a number of different types of insurancepolicies, including personal lines, workers compensation, health, groupbenefits, and other commercial policies. Pursuant to some embodiments,virtual affinity group processing platform 110 receives data from a widevariety of sources including one or more social media or other websitesor properties 120-130 and devices 102, 104, 106. The data received isused to enhance interactions with consumers and insured individuals andbusinesses. Further, virtual affinity group processing platform 110 maytransmit data and notifications to consumers and insured individuals andbusinesses directly to devices 102, 104 or 106 or through one or moresocial media sites 120-130.

Further, pursuant to some embodiments, virtual affinity group processingplatform 110 may cause the creation, maintenance, and updating of one ormore virtual affinity groups 140 which are created as described herein.Those virtual affinity groups 140 may be created using platforms such asone or more existing social media sites 120-130 (e.g., a virtualaffinity group such as the AUDI A4 group described above, may includeinformation hosted on a FACEBOOK® page) or other web platforms (e.g.,the AUDI A4 group may include a WORDPRESS® powered website hosted on asubdomain or primary domain), or the like. For example, in oneillustrative embodiment, an insurance company may use the infrastructureof an existing social network (such as those provided by FACEBOOK® orGOOGLE+®) to create virtual affinity groups for eligible individuals.

While a virtual affinity group pursuant to the present invention mayinclude the use of a content platform allowing participants to interactwith the group, such content is not required. For example, in someembodiments, virtual affinity groups may be created which do not includecurated or other generated content. Instead, the virtual affinity groupconsists of individuals who share one or more characteristics of thegroup and those individuals are flagged or identified by the insuranceprocessing platform 100 as being members of the group. Participation orinclusion in the group may provide the members with one or moreinsurance-related benefits (such as eligibility for reduced insurancerates, pre-qualification for one or more insurance products, or thelike).

As used herein, devices including those associated with the virtualaffinity group processing platform 110, and any other device describedherein may exchange information via any communication network 160 whichmay be one or more of a Local Area Network (LAN), a Metropolitan AreaNetwork (MAN), a Wide Area Network (WAN), a proprietary network, aPublic Switched Telephone Network (PSTN), a Wireless ApplicationProtocol (WAP) network, a Bluetooth network, a wireless LAN network,and/or an Internet Protocol (IP) network such as the Internet, anintranet, or an extranet. Note that any devices described herein maycommunicate via one or more such communication networks.

Sites 120-130 may store, publish or otherwise provide access toinformation about consumers. For example, a consumer with a FACEBOOKaccount may post status updates, information and comments to FACEBOOK,and FACEBOOK may publish or otherwise make the status updates,information or comments available to authorized individuals or entities.In some embodiments, one or more of the sites 120-130 may publish orotherwise disseminate the information via an application programminginterface (“API”), an RSS feed, or some other structured format. Forexample, for virtual affinity groups that use fitness or health data asa potential characteristic, data from a fitness-related API such as thatprovided by FITBIT may be analyzed. The information may be analyzed orused by the virtual affinity group processing platform 110 on anindividual item basis or on an aggregate basis with other information.Further the data may be combined with one or more other data sources,such as publicly available data provided by the U.S. Census Bureau orthe like. Pursuant to some embodiments, data collected about individualsmay be indexed to aggregate data across a wide variety of data sourcesas well as to de-identify any personally identifiable information. Forexample, a record about a consumer may include a non-personallyidentifiable identifier used to associate information about the consumersuch as name, address, one or more social media user names, telephonenumbers, email addresses, with information associated withcharacteristic data collected pursuant to the operation of the presentinvention.

As shown, the virtual affinity group processing platform 110 may includea number of modules or components, including one or more underwritingmodules 112, quoting modules 114, issuing modules 116, notificationmodules 118 and group administration module 119. Virtual affinity groupprocessing platform 110 may be deployed as a number of differentplatforms in communication with each other (for example, one processingplatform may be deployed as a virtual affinity group administrationplatform, while another may be deployed to function as benefit issuanceplatform). Pursuant to the present invention, the notification modules118 may be used to transmit information to eligible individuals, toservice providers, and to other entities, including information relatingto one or more virtual affinity groups established pursuant to thepresent invention. In some embodiments, one or more group administrationmodules 119 may be provided to receive data associated with differentvirtual affinity groups, including information used to create andmaintain one or more virtual affinity groups.

As will be described further below, the underwriting modules 112 may beused in conjunction with the creation and updating of one or more ratingschedules for use in pricing and rating insurance policies or increating insurance benefits or other offers for virtual affinity groupspursuant to embodiments of the present invention. For example, in someembodiments, the underwriting modules 112 are used to analyze bothconventional underwriting data such as historical loss information inconjunction with social and business network based data for use inrating and pricing business insurance policies.

Referring still to FIG. 1, the quoting and issuing modules 114 and 116may be used in conjunction with the quoting, rating and pricing ofinsurance policies (e.g., in response to requests for quotes receivedfrom participants in virtual affinity groups). Note that theunderwriting module 112, quoting module 114, and/or issuing module 116may be associated with various types of insurance policies, includingautomobile and home insurance policies, for individuals and/orcompanies.

Although a single virtual affinity group processing platform 110 isshown in FIG. 1, any number of such devices may be included. Moreover,various devices described herein might be combined according toembodiments of the present invention. For example, in some embodiments,the virtual affinity group processing platform 110 and modules 112-119might be co-located and/or may comprise a single apparatus.

The virtual affinity group processing platform 110 and the modules112-119 may also access information in one or more databases 170, 180and 190. The databases may include, for example, risk characteristicdata 170, historical loss data 180 associated with previously-issuedinsurance policies, and policy data 190 associated with active policies.As will be described further below, the policy data 190 may be used toprocess information associated with virtual affinity groups establishedpursuant to the present invention and to provide insurance relatedoffers (and process insurance requests) from individuals associated withvirtual affinity groups. The data from such data sources may be used toidentify one or more starting aggregated groups that are used toidentify one or more characteristics for the creation of a virtualaffinity group. For example, pursuant to some embodiments, a data miningand analysis process may be performed to identify desiredcharacteristics for a virtual affinity group from underwriting and lossdata (e.g., obtained from data sources 170-190).

Referring now to FIG. 2, one embodiment of the present invention isshown for generating and administering virtual affinity groups for usein providing targeted offers of insurance, insurance renewalinformation, or other insurance related information. As shown in FIG. 2,the virtual affinity group processing platform 200 communicates vianetwork 210 to send data to, and receive data from, a plurality of userdevices 220 (such as mobile phones, computers, or the like), a pluralityof data sources 230 (such as social networking sites, public datasources, or the like), and a plurality of virtual affinity groups 240 toenable an insurance company to generate and administer virtual affinitygroups for use in providing insurance-related offers and information.

Platform 200 also may include a number of devices or components,including computer processor(s) 275 and text processing units 250. Thecomputer processor 275 and the text processing unit 250 may include oneor more conventional microprocessors and may operate to executeprogrammed instructions to provide functionality as described herein.Among other functions, the computer processor 275 and/or the textprocessor 250 may access and retrieve information from data source(s)230 via network interface unit 260 and input/output controller 270 viasystem bus 280.

Data identifying one or more desired characteristics may be stored in adata store 296. The characteristic data may be obtained from one or moredata modeling or analytic processes based on existing insuranceinformation. For example, an insurance modeling process may identifycertain characteristics as providing a desirable insurance risk profile.Information identifying such characteristics may be stored in data store296 and used in the creation of a virtual affinity group of individualspossessing the characteristic. In some embodiments, additionalcharacteristic data may be added as further attributes of a virtualaffinity group become known. The characteristic data is then used toidentify individuals who possess the characteristic.

For example, in a mode of operation in which the virtual affinity groupprocessor is operated to identify eligible individuals for participationin a virtual affinity group (such a the AUDI A4 group introduced aboveas an illustrative example), the text processor 250 may be operated toscan existing forums, social media sites, and other web sites to analyzedata associated with individuals interested in AUDI A4 automobiles. Thedata analyzed may include forum posts, comments, Web blog posts, images,preferences (such as preferences or profile data associated with useraccounts on sites such as GOOGLE+, FACEBOOK, or the like), TWITTERposts, etc. The text processor 250 may be programmed to identifydifferent types of statements or comments that are relevant to thevirtual affinity group. For example, natural language processingtechniques may be used to mine certain characteristic information basedon the characteristics of the virtual affinity group to determinewhether an individual is eligible to participate in the virtual affinitygroup.

Pursuant to some embodiments in which the virtual affinity group isestablished with a high level of interest required for participation ina group, different weightings of types of data may be established andused when mining data. For example, if the AUDI A4 virtual affinitygroup is created to only allow participation by individuals owning anAUDI A4 who exhibit a level of interest that tends to suggest that thoseindividuals would be a low insurance risk, the text processor 250 may beprogrammed to weight certain types of comments more heavily. As aspecific illustrative example, it may be determined that individuals whoactively maintain and care for their cars present a lower insuranceclaim risk. As such, the text processor 250 may be programmed to givegreater weight to comments associated with AUDI A4 maintenance.Individuals who post frequent quality comments on an AUDI A4 maintenanceforum would be more likely to be invited to participate in the virtualaffinity group than individuals who do not.

Other parameters, criteria and inputs may be provided to control thetext processor 250 to collect and analyze data such that only eligibleindividuals are identified for participation in virtual affinity groups.For example, individuals who are frequent commenters or posters oncertain types of authority sites may be targeted. Authority sites may beidentified using any of a number of different criteria. For example,GOOGLE'S PAGERANK system may be used to identify credible or authoritysites (where sites having a higher PAGERANK may be considered morecredible than sites with lower PAGERANK scores). As another example,relative traffic data between different sites may also be used to assessthe authority of sites (for example, a site with a higher number ofmonthly page views may be considered to be more authoritative than asite with a low number of monthly page views).

Other indicia of an individual's engagement or interest level may alsobe used. For example, certain Web sites rank commenters or participantsand categorize the reputation of individual participants based on howmuch the community trusts the individual's knowledge on a topic,communication skills, and the quality and relevancy of the individual'squestions and answers and participation. For example, Stackexchange.comand other similar sites provide badges indicating the reputation levelof each participant. A participant with a high number of quality andknowledgeable comments on a topic may be classified as a “Super User”.Such indicators of an individual's quality and quantity of engagement ona topic may be used to characterize the individual's level of interestand expertise in an area and may be used as a characteristic or criteriafor inclusion in a virtual affinity group pursuant to some embodiments.

The virtual affinity group processing platform 200 may further include aprogram memory 282 that is coupled to the computer processor 275. Theprogram memory 282 may include a random access memory 284 and a readonly memory 286. System memory 282 is further coupled via bus 280 to oneor more fixed storage devices 290, such as one or more hard disk drives,flash memories, tape drives or other similar storage devices. Storagedevices 290 may store one or more application programs 292, an operatingsystem 294, and one or more databases such as a characteristic database296 for storing data identifying characteristics or criteria that areused to determine which individuals are eligible for participation in avirtual affinity group. For example, characteristics or criteria mayinclude: geographic data (e.g., data identifying where an individualmust reside to participate), demographic data (e.g., income, gender,age, or other data required for eligible individuals), engagement data(e.g., information identifying a quantity and/or quality of interestdata needed to be considered eligible for participation), or the like.Other attributes may also be analyzed to determine whether an individualis eligible for participation in a group. For example, statements,postings or other comments (generally referred to herein as “comments”)made by an individual may be positively correlated with risk based onthe nature of those comments or may be weighted differently than othercomments by that individual. As an example, comments with low sentencecomplexity, inappropriate language, or poor grammar may be given lessweight than comments with high sentence complexity and spellingaccuracy. Platform 200 may also include a member database 298 forstoring data associated with a plurality of individuals identified aseligible for participation in the virtual affinity group. For example,the member database 298 may include information identifying individualsby name, address, phone number, IP address, or the like. In someembodiments, members may be further identified using one or more uniquecodes or identifiers used to permit access to the virtual affinitygroup.

Platform 200 may be, according to some embodiments, accessible via aGraphical User Interface (GUI) rendered at least in part by input/outputcontroller 270. The GUI might be used, for example, to dynamicallydisplay information associated with virtual affinity groups, as well asthe administration of those groups. For example, in some embodiments, auser interface such as that shown and described below in conjunctionwith FIG. 5 may be provided as a portal or page for members of a virtualaffinity group to obtain information and benefits provided as a resultof their participation in a virtual affinity group. In some embodiments,participation in a virtual affinity group need not include access tosuch a portal or page for members; instead, participation may beautomatic once an individual is determined to possess the requisitecharacteristics of the group.

Referring still to FIG. 2, the platform 200 performs processing toreceive, process and extract relevant information from data source(s)230 (such as social network data, search queries, blog comments, forumposts, etc.). The processing and extraction of information from the datasource(s) 230 may take one or more of a number of different forms. Forexample, the processing platform 200 may monitor or search for activityassociated with certain defined characteristics associated with one ormore virtual affinity groups. In the illustrative example, the platform200 may be operated to search for activity associated with “AUDI A4”searches, comments or posts to identify potential participants in avirtual affinity group for AUDI A4 enthusiasts. As another example, theprocessing platform 200 may perform actions to invite or encourage suchidentified individuals to participate in an established virtual affinitygroup. As another example, the processing platform 200 may perform oneor more insurance-related actions to underwrite, quote or issueinsurance products for participants in a virtual affinity group. Otherexamples will be introduced in the embodiments described below. Thesearch and processing of processing platform 200 may involve the use ofnatural language processing techniques to determine whether certainsearch, posting, or other activities of consumers contain, in substance,information relevant to one or more virtual affinity groups.

It is contemplated that the processing platform 200 may process data andinformation in one or more languages, such English, French, Arabic,Spanish, Chinese, German, Japanese and the like. In an exemplaryembodiment, underwriting analysis by the platform 200 also can beemployed for sophisticated text analyses, wherein text can be recognizedirrespective of the text language. The relationships between the variouswords/phrases can be clarified by using an insurance rules engines forclassifying words/phrases as a predictor of certain underwriting risk oras a predictor of intent or interest (e.g., to determine whether anindividual should be eligible for participation in a virtual affinitygroup).

Reference is now made to FIG. 3, in which an embodiment of a system 300configured to identify eligible individuals for participation in avirtual affinity group is shown. As shown, system 300 includes a mobiledevice 310 operated by an individual. The individual is shown operatingthe mobile device 310 to post a “tweet” on twitter.com using his TWITTERaccount (“johndoe123”). The tweet is a message announcing that theindividual is “loving my new AUDI A4”, and sending the message willcause a website 320 (e.g., twitter.com) to post an update associatedwith johndoe123's TWITTER feed with the content of the message. Pursuantto some embodiments, TWITTER feeds (as well as data from a variety ofother sites and forums) are monitored by the virtual affinity groupprocessing platform 340 to identify messages and posts which meet one ormore characteristic data 350 associated with one or more virtualaffinity groups. The data from the site 320 may be received and parsedusing one or more application programming interfaces (“APIs”) 370 whichallow data from a large number of different sites to be collected andmonitored by the virtual affinity group processing platform 340.

In the illustrative example introduced above, a virtual affinity groupfor AUDI A4 aficionados has been created (shown as item 380). Eligibleindividuals who may be invited to participate in the virtual affinitygroup may be identified by monitoring or analyzing posts, comments,messages or other actions taken by those individuals on third partywebsites (such as twitter.com). In the example shown in FIG. 3,“johndoe123” may be identified as an eligible individual as he hasexpressed a current interest in AUDI A4s. Additional analysis ofjohndoe123 may be made under control of the virtual affinity groupprocessing platform 340 to determine his eligibility. For example, asingle post or comment may not be sufficient to become eligible, and thesystem may analyze additional comments or posts by johndoe123 todetermine whether further interest in AUDI A4s has been expressed.Further, information (such as from third party databases) may be used todetermine where the individual is located geographically, to determine ademographic profile of the individual, or the like. If the individual isdetermined to be eligible for participation in the virtual affinitygroup, a notification of the group may be communicated to the individualinviting participation in the group (e.g., in the illustrative example,johndoe123 may be sent a message over TWITTER to invite hisparticipation in the group).

Individuals may create content and interact with third party websitesusing any of a number of different types of computing devices, includingdesktop computers, tablet computers, or mobile devices such as themobile device 310. The mobile device 310 may be any of a number ofdifferent types of mobile devices that allow for wireless communicationand that may be carried with or by a user. For example, in someembodiments, mobile device 310 is an IPHONE® from Apple, Inc., aBLACKBERRY® from RIM, a mobile phone using the GOOGLE ANDROID® operatingsystem, a portable or tablet computer (such as the IPOD® from Apple,Inc.), a mobile device operating the Android® operating system or otherportable computing device having an ability to communicate wirelesslywith a remote entity such as a third party website 320.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart of a process 400 for establishing a virtualaffinity group pursuant to some embodiments. The process 400 can beperformed by the processing platform 110 (as shown in FIG. 1) or acombination of devices as described herein. The process 400 begins at402 with the establishment of one or more characteristics of a virtualaffinity group. The establishment of the characteristics may beperformed by an administrator or operator of a system such as the system100 or it may be an automated process. In embodiments where theestablishment is performed by an administrator or operator, processingat 402 may include interaction with a user interface to definecharacteristics of a virtual affinity group to be created.

Processing at 402 may begin with information from a known set ofinsurance characteristics such as an aggregated group known to possess adesired insurance risk profile. For example, continuing the illustrativeexample, processing at 402 may include an operator assigning a virtualaffinity group name (such as “AUDI A4 Group”), and then selecting orotherwise identifying one or more known characteristics of a aggregatedgroup for inclusion in the virtual affinity group. For example, one ofthe starting characteristics of the AUDI A4 Group may be demographic,geographic or financial characteristics that are known to possess adesired insurance risk profile for automobile insurance. Those knowncharacteristics may be used as a seed or a starting point for anadministrator to define the set of characteristics required forparticipation in the virtual affinity group. The administrator may bepresented with a set of characteristics to be selected from one or morepredetermined characteristics that may be used across different virtualaffinity groups (such as geographical characteristics, demographiccharacteristics or the like), and/or they may be custom attributesdefined for each virtual affinity group. Custom attributes may includecharacteristics or criteria such as search terms, keywords, sites ofinterest, or the like. In the illustrative example, processing at 402may include an operator defining one or more of the followingcharacteristics for inclusion in the AUDI A4 Group:

TABLE 1 Characteristic Required Values Geographic Location U.S. IncomeLevel >$100,000 Gender Male, Female Age >21 Keywords AUDI, AUDI A4, AUDImaintenance, AUDI repair, AUDI accessories Engagement Level >5 commentswithin 1 month

Once the required set of characteristics for inclusion in the virtualaffinity group have been established, processing continues at 404 wherean operator or administrator of the virtual affinity group defines oneor more features of the virtual affinity group. The features may beselected from among a set of predefined templates or may be customdefined for each virtual affinity group. As an example, the features ofa virtual affinity group may include features relating to content andinformation to be provided to participants. In embodiments where thevirtual affinity group is one which will provide information toparticipants, features may also include information used to construct anautomated portal or Web site which can be accessed by participants inthe virtual affinity group. For example, continuing the illustrativeexample, features of the AUDI A4 Group may include a URL or web addressassociated with a portal of information including automated information(e.g., collected and displayed using RSS or XML feeds of information),static information (e.g., such as content specifically created for thegroup), and interactive information (e.g., such as forums, question andanswer tools, or the like). The features may cause the display of a userinterface such as the user interface shown in conjunction with FIG. 5.

Referring briefly to FIG. 5, an illustrative user interface 500 is shownwhich may be associated with a virtual affinity group established by thesystem of the present invention in embodiments in which participants areencouraged to visit a web site to interact with other participants inthe group and view group information, features, and benefits (in otherembodiments, no such web property is created—instead, participants areable to enjoy insurance related benefits available to members of thevirtual affinity group without visiting such a web property). In theillustrative user interface 500, an example layout of a page is shownwhich may include a virtual affinity group logo or identifier, an areafor one or more insurance benefit offers (e.g., which may be display adsor other forms of presenting an offer), one or more areas for displayingrelevant content items (such as curated content, specially writtencontent, or automatically generated or collected content from othersources about topics of interest to members of the virtual affinitygroup), and one or more areas for displaying interactive content (suchas forums, question and answer pages, or the like). In this manner, insome embodiments, highly targeted and relevant content and offers may bepresented to participants in the virtual affinity group.

In other embodiments, a portal or set of content may not be provided toparticipants. Instead, individuals who possess the requisitecharacteristics may automatically be identified as participants in thegroup, and any benefits or features of inclusion in the group may beautomatically extended to those individuals. For example, an individualwho possesses the required characteristics for inclusion in the AUDI A4group may receive the insurance-related benefits automatically. Forexample, if the individual applies for an automobile insurance policyfrom the insurance company associated with the AUDI A4 group, theindividual may be automatically identified as being eligible for thebenefits associated with the AUDI A4 group and may receive a discount,different pricing, or the like.

Referring again to FIG. 4, processing continues at 406 where one or moreinsurance-related benefits of the virtual affinity group areestablished. For example, pursuant to some embodiments, the benefits mayinclude one or more insurance related benefits or offers that are to beprovided to the participants in the virtual affinity group. In someembodiments, the insurance related benefits or offers may be designedbased on an underwriting or risk analysis performed based on thecharacteristics established at 402. For example, continuing theillustrative example, the benefits associated with the AUDI A4 Group mayinclude one or more insurance benefits designed to appeal to AUDI A4aficionados who have an annual household income in excess of $100,000and who are over 21 years of age. The insurance benefits may includeoffers of personal lines insurance targeted to AUDI owners or relatedinsurance products. By creating such benefits based on thecharacteristics of individuals who will be invited to participate in thevirtual affinity group, insurance benefits may be designed which closelymatch the interests of the group and that are priced based on attributesof the group. Insurance offers may thus be created that are priced basedon the relative risk of a group of individuals having knowncharacteristics. In some embodiments, the benefits may include groupinsurance benefits that are targeted to the affinity group.

Processing continues at 408 where a process is launched or initiated toidentify eligible individuals for participation in the virtual affinitygroup. Eligible individuals are identified by applying one or morecharacteristics (defined at 402) to data collected or otherwiseprocessed by the virtual affinity group processing platform 110. Forexample, once the characteristics of a group are defined, an automatedprocess may be initiated which searches for information aboutindividuals meeting those characteristics. In the illustrativeembodiment, posts, comments, profiles, search queries, and other datamay be processed to identify adult individuals in the U.S. who have anannual household income in excess of $100,000 and who have made morethan 5 recent comments or posts involving certain keywords associatedwith “AUDI A4” topics. In some embodiments, processing at 408 may berepeated on a daily or more frequent basis to continually identifypotential participants in the virtual affinity group. In someembodiments, the process may include further parameters to refine thesources of data to be analyzed. For example, the process may be limitedto scanning or analyzing certain web properties (e.g., such as limitingthe searches or analysis to data from FACEBOOK, TWITTER, AUDIforums.com,or the like). Information about individuals who meet the characteristicrequirements are stored in a database (such as member database 298).

Processing continues at 410 where the system is operated to communicateinvitations to eligible individuals to join or otherwise participate inthe virtual affinity group. In some embodiments, the data collectedabout eligible individuals at 408 includes contact data (such as anemail address, physical mailing address, FACEBOOK OR TWITTER ID, or thelike). For eligible individuals that have contact information,processing at 410 may include the generation and transmission of aninvitation to participate in the virtual affinity group. In someembodiments, rather than transmitting an invitation to participate,eligible individuals may be presented with a display advertisement(e.g., using ad retargeting or other techniques) to promote theirparticipation in the virtual affinity group. In some embodiments,eligible individuals need not be informed of their eligibility toparticipate in the virtual affinity group—instead, those individuals arede facto participants in the group based on the determination that theymeet the characteristic data for the group.

In embodiments where eligible individuals are notified regarding theireligibility for participation in a virtual affinity group, thenotification may be performed by an email, direct message, mail, ortelephone call in which details of the features and benefits ofparticipating in the virtual affinity group are communicated to eacheligible individual. The notification may include information foraccessing and interacting with the virtual affinity group and, in someembodiments, may include a unique identifier, code or other identifierused to access the virtual affinity group and identify the individual.The information communicated may include instructions for accessing thevirtual affinity group (including user names and passwords) as well asinformation identifying the nature of the insurance benefits availableto the individual through their participation in the group.

Pursuant to some embodiments, the communication performed at 410 may beperformed by providing a highly segmented list of participants to one ormore insurance agents or brokers for use in contacting the participantsto make one or more insurance-related offers. For example, a file orfeed of data of participants may be provided to agents or brokers indifferent geographical areas for their use in communicating offers toparticipants.

Process 400 may be repeated as needed to continue to identify eligibleparticipants. Further, process 400 may include an update process inwhich additional characteristics are identified. The update process mayanalyze participants of the group to identify one or more additionalcharacteristics shared by at least a portion of the group which arepredicted (or shown) to provide desirable insurance related risk. Theupdate process may result in the addition of one or more requiredcharacteristics for inclusion in the group, or it may result in thecreation of one or more additional groups. In this manner, embodimentsallow the creation of highly targeted groups of individuals who share acommon interest or profile and who can receive insurance related offersor information based on those common interests or profiles.

The following illustrates various additional embodiments of theinvention. These do not constitute a definition of all possibleembodiments, and those skilled in the art will understand that thepresent invention is applicable to many other embodiments. Further,although the following embodiments are briefly described for clarity,those skilled in the art will understand how to make any changes, ifnecessary, to the above-described apparatus and methods to accommodatethese and other embodiments and applications.

While the illustrative example presented herein relates to atopic-centric virtual affinity group, embodiments may also be providedwhich are product or merchant-centric. For example, in amerchant-centric embodiment, specific merchants (such as, for example, arestaurant) may be the subject of a special type of virtual affinitygroup which involves participants who are patrons of the merchant.Customers who have visited or otherwise are familiar with the merchantmay be identified and invited to join or participate in a virtualaffinity group associated with the merchant. Those participants may beprompted to provide information about the merchant and their experiencewith the merchant. In some embodiments, the information solicited mayinclude information used by an insurance company to validate policy dataassociated with the merchant. As an illustrative example, in the case ofa restaurant insured by an insurance provider, customers who havepatronized the restaurant may be identified and invited to participatein a virtual affinity group associated with the restaurant. Participantsmay be prompted to provide information about the restaurant includinginformation about their experience and also information about therestaurant operations and facility. The information about the restaurantoperations and facility can be designed to validate or confirm detailsregarding the restaurant's insurance coverage and policy. For example,participants may be prompted to provide responses to questions such as:whether the restaurant was maintained in a clean condition, whether therestaurant served alcohol, whether the restaurant had a pool table,whether the restaurant had one or more video game machines, or the like.Some or each of these questions may be associated with an insuranceunderwriting or policy objective, and may be used to validate or updateinformation associated with the insurance policy of the restaurant. Theresult is an ability to easily collect information from a variety ofparticipants that may be useful in validating or auditing insurancerelated information.

Although specific hardware and data configurations have been describedherein, not that any number of other configurations may be provided inaccordance with embodiments of the present invention (e.g., some of theinformation associated with the databases described herein may becombined or stored in external systems).

The term “computer-readable medium” as used herein refers to anynon-transitory medium that provides or participates in providinginstructions to the processor of the computing device (or any otherprocessor of a device described herein) for execution. Such a medium maytake many forms, including but not limited to, non-volatile media andvolatile media. Non-volatile media include, for example, optical,magnetic, or opto-magnetic disks, or integrated circuit memory, such asflash memory. Volatile media include Dynamic Random Access Memory(“DRAM”), which typically constitutes the main memory. Common forms ofcomputer-readable media include, for example, a floppy disk, a flexibledisk, hard disk, magnetic tape, any other magnetic medium, a CD-ROM,DVD, any other optical medium, punch cards, paper tape, any otherphysical medium with patterns of holes, a RAM, a PROM, an EPROM orElectronically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory (“EEPROM”), aFLASH-EEPROM, any other memory chip or cartridge, or any othernon-transitory medium from which a computer can read.

Various forms of computer readable media may be involved in carrying oneor more sequences of one or more instructions to a processor (such asthe processor 275 of FIG. 2, or any other processor of a devicedescribed herein) for execution. For example, the instructions mayinitially be borne on a magnetic disk of a remote computer (not shown).The remote computer can load the instructions into its dynamic memoryand send the instructions over an Ethernet connection, cable line, oreven telephone line using a modem. A communications device local to acomputing device (e.g., a server) can receive the data on the respectivecommunications line and place the data on a system bus for theprocessor. The system bus carries the data to main memory, from whichthe processor retrieves and executes the instructions. The instructionsreceived by main memory may optionally be stored in memory either beforeor after execution by the processor. In addition, instructions may bereceived via a communication port as electrical, electromagnetic oroptical signals, which are exemplary forms of wireless communications ordata streams that carry various types of information.

The present invention has been described in terms of several embodimentssolely for the purpose of illustration. Persons skilled in the art willrecognize from this description that the invention is not limited to theembodiments described, but may be practiced with modifications andalterations limited only by the spirit and scope of the appended claims.

What is claimed is:
 1. A computer system, comprising: one or morevirtual affinity group computer processors in communication with the oneor more data storage devices; a text processing unit; and a memory incommunication with the one or more virtual affinity group computerprocessors and storing program instructions, the one or more virtualaffinity group computer processors operative with the programinstructions to: access, from one or more data storage devices,historical underwriting data and historical loss data, and analyze thehistorical underwriting data and the historical loss data to determinean aggregated group of risk characteristics; identify a first set ofcharacteristics of the virtual affinity group to be created, the firstset of characteristics based upon analysis of the aggregated group ofrisk characteristics and comprising at least a demographic attribute anda psychographic attribute; create the virtual affinity group based onthe identified first set of characteristics; create a web propertydomain for the virtual affinity group, wherein the web property domainincludes automated feed-generated content accessible by members of thevirtual affinity group; determine, based on a risk analysis performedbased on the identified first set of characteristics, a benefit to beoffered to members of the virtual affinity group; receive datacollection instructions identifying at least one online web site tomonitor for potential members of the virtual affinity group; responsiveto creation of the web property domain, periodically launch a potentialmember identification process to: scan, by the text processing unitbased upon the data collection instructions, online data from the atleast one online web site; analyze, by the text processing unit, thescanned online data to identify at least a first individual matching thefirst set of characteristics of the virtual affinity group, theanalyzing including categorizing an interest level psychographicattribute of the potential members of the virtual affinity group; updatea virtual affinity group membership database to include informationidentifying the at least first individual as being eligible formembership in the virtual affinity group; transmit an invitation to theat least first individual to join the virtual affinity group; andresponsive to receipt of an affirmative response to the invitation,provide access to the web property domain and the benefit, to the atleast first individual.
 2. The computer system of claim 1, furthercomprising a policy quoting system comprising: one or more quoting datastorage devices; one or more quoting processors in communication withthe one or more data storage devices; a quoting system memory incommunication with the one or more quoting processors and storingquoting program instructions, the one or more quoting processorsoperative with the quoting program instructions to: receive a requestfor a policy quote from the computer system for an individual identifiedin the virtual affinity group membership database; determine the policyquote for the individual; and provide the policy quote to the computersystem.
 3. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the one or morevirtual affinity group computer processors are further operative withthe program instructions to analyze the scanned online data to identifya geographic characteristic of the virtual affinity group, thegeographic characteristic identifying an additional desiredcharacteristic of members of the virtual affinity group and wherein theone or more virtual affinity group computer processors being operativewith the program instructions to analyze the scanned online data toidentify the at least first individual further comprises the one or morevirtual affinity group computer processors being operative with theprogram instructions to analyze the scanned online data to identify theat least first individual matching the geographic characteristic of thevirtual affinity group.
 4. The computer system of claim 1, wherein theone or more virtual affinity group computer processors being operativewith the program instructions to analyze the scanned online data tocategorize the interest level psychographic attribute of the potentialmembers of the virtual affinity group comprises the one or more virtualaffinity group computer processors being operative with the programinstructions to analyze the scanned online data with the text processingunit to identify statements or comments relevant to the virtual affinitygroup and identify the at least first individual matching the first setof characteristics of the virtual affinity group based on the identifiedstatements or comments.
 5. The system of claim 4, wherein the statementsor comments relevant to the virtual affinity group are weighted by thetext processing unit to give a predetermined greater weight to thestatements or comments by individuals who exhibit one or both of (a) apredetermined level of interest in a subject matter related to thevirtual affinity group, or (b) comments of a predetermined qualityposted on a subject matter related to the virtual affinity group, thanto the statements or comments by individuals who do not exhibit thepredetermined level of interest or the comments of the predeterminedquality.
 6. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one online website comprises at least one of an online forum and a social media website, and wherein the at least one of the online forum and the socialmedia web site comprises an authority site identified based upon a pageview traffic data analysis.
 7. The system of claim 6, whereinidentifying the authority sites based upon the page view traffic dataanalysis of the authority sites comprises: the one or more virtualaffinity group computer processors being further operative with theprogram instructions to identify the authority sites having apredetermined threshold ranking or a predetermined threshold level oftraffic and data from commenters who have posted with a predeterminedfrequency on the authority sites; wherein the one or more virtualaffinity group computer processors being operative with the programinstructions to analyze the scanned online data to identify the at leastfirst individual comprises the one or more virtual affinity groupcomputer processors being operative with the program instructions toscan the data from the authority sites to identify the commenters whohave posted with the predetermined frequency on the authority sites andidentify the at least first individual matching the first set ofcharacteristics of the virtual affinity group from the commenters whohave posted with the predetermined frequency on the authority sites. 8.The system of claim 6, wherein the one or more virtual affinity groupcomputer processors being operative with the program instructions toanalyze the scanned online data to identify the at least firstindividual comprises the one or more virtual affinity group computerprocessors being operative with the program instructions to: analyze thescanned online data with the text processing unit to identify anauthority site generated reputation level of individuals associated withthe authority sites; and identify the at least first individual matchingthe first set of characteristics of the virtual affinity group based onthe authority site generated reputation level of individuals associatedwith the authority sites.
 9. A computer-implemented method, comprising:analyzing, by a virtual affinity group computer processor, historicalunderwriting data and historical loss data to determine an aggregatedgroup of risk characteristics; identifying, by the virtual affinitygroup computer processor based upon analysis of the aggregated group ofrisk characteristics, a first set of characteristics of the virtualaffinity group to be created, the identified first set ofcharacteristics comprising at least a demographic attribute and apsychographic attribute; creating, by the virtual affinity groupcomputer processor, the virtual affinity group based on the identifiedfirst set of characteristics; creating, by the virtual affinity groupcomputer processor, a web property domain for the virtual affinity groupincluding automated feed-generated content accessible by members of thevirtual affinity group; determining, by the virtual affinity groupcomputer processor, based on a risk analysis performed based on theidentified first set of characteristics, a benefit to be offered to thevirtual affinity group; receiving, by the virtual affinity groupcomputer processor, data collection instructions identifying at leastone online web site to monitor for potential members of the virtualaffinity group responsive to creation of the web property domain,periodically launching a potential member identification processcomprising: scanning, by a text processing unit based upon the datacollection instructions, online data from the at least one online website via an application programming interface of the at least one onlineweb site; analyzing, by the text processing unit, the scanned onlinedata to identify at least a first individual matching the identifiedfirst set of characteristics of the virtual affinity group, theanalyzing including categorizing an interest level psychographicattribute of the potential members of the virtual affinity group;updating, by the virtual affinity group computer processor, a virtualaffinity group membership database to include information identifyingthe at least first individual as being eligible for membership in thevirtual affinity group; transmitting an invitation to the at least firstindividual to join the virtual affinity group; and responsive to receiptof an affirmative response to the invitation, providing, by the virtualaffinity group computer processor, the at least first individual withthe benefit and access to the web property domain for the virtualaffinity group.
 10. The computer-implemented method of claim 9, whereincreating the web property domain comprises creating at least one of asubdomain and a top level domain.
 11. The computer-implemented method ofclaim 9, wherein determining the benefit to be offered to the virtualaffinity group comprises determining one of a pre-qualification for anoffer and a reduced rate for a product.
 12. The computer-implementedmethod of claim 11, wherein the at least one online web site comprisesat least one of an online forum and a social media web site.
 13. Thecomputer-implemented method of claim 12, wherein the at least one of theonline forum and the social media web site comprises an authority siteidentified based upon a page view traffic data analysis.
 14. Thecomputer-implemented method of claim 9, wherein categorizing theinterest level psychographic attribute of the potential members of thevirtual affinity group comprises categorizing the interest levelpsychographic attribute of the potential members of the virtual affinitygroup based upon natural language processing of the scanned online data.15. The computer-implemented method of claim 9, wherein analyzing thescanned online data to categorize the interest level psychographicattribute of the potential members of the virtual affinity groupcomprises scanning the scanned online data with the text processing unitto identify statements or comments relevant to the virtual affinitygroup and identifying the at least first individual matching the firstset of characteristics of the virtual affinity group based on theidentified statements or comments; wherein the statements or commentsrelevant to the virtual affinity group are weighted by the textprocessing unit to give a predetermined greater weight to comments byindividuals who exhibit one or more of (a) a predetermined high numberof posts of a predetermined quality on a subject matter related to thevirtual affinity group, (b) posts of a predetermined quality on asubject matter related to the virtual affinity group, and (c) commentswith a predetermined level of correct grammar and a predetermined levelof spelling accuracy, than to comments by individuals who do not exhibitthe predetermined number of posts, the posts of the predeterminedquality, or the comments with the predetermined level of correct grammarand the predetermined level of spelling accuracy.
 16. Thecomputer-implemented method of claim 13, wherein identifying theauthority sites based upon the page view traffic data analysis of theauthority sites comprises: identifying, in the scanned online data, datafrom the authority sites having a predetermined threshold ranking or apredetermined threshold level of traffic, and data from commenters whohave posted with a predetermined frequency on the authority sites;wherein analyzing the scanned online data to identify the at least firstindividual comprises scanning the data from the authority sites toidentify the at least first individual matching the first set ofcharacteristics of the virtual affinity group from the commenters whohave posted with the predetermined frequency on the authority sites.